Chiplet interconnect startup Eliyan Corporation has closed a $145 million Series C round at a $1 billion valuation, minting a new AI-infrastructure unicorn as hyperscalers scramble for faster and more power-efficient ways to wire together next-generation accelerators.
Seligman Ventures leads with Cisco and Lumentum strategic checks
The oversubscribed Series C was announced on July 29, 2026 and led by Seligman Ventures, with new strategic investors Cisco Investments and Lumentum joining existing backers. The round more than doubles Eliyan’s prior funding: the Santa Clara company raised a $40 million Series A in 2022 and a $60 million Series B in 2024. Seligman managing partner Umesh Padval joins the board.
Chip-to-chip, die-to-die and rack-to-rack for AI clusters
Founded in 2021 by repeat semiconductor entrepreneurs Ramin Farjadrad, Patrick Soheili and Syrus Ziai, Eliyan builds interconnect PHYs and chiplets that manage bandwidth density, link reliability and power efficiency across compute, memory and electro-optical domains. Its NuLink PHY and NuGear chiplet families cover chip-to-chip, die-to-die and rack-to-rack architectures, with electro-optical interconnects targeted at the emerging generation of AI clusters where copper reach and power budgets are hitting hard limits.
Riding the AI-data-center bottleneck
The proceeds will fund development of next-generation connectivity products, ecosystem partnerships and manufacturing scale. Eliyan says its technology is already being evaluated by hyperscalers, AI-accelerator vendors, memory suppliers and optical module makers. The round follows several other AI-infrastructure mega-rounds this summer, including HappyRobot’s $150M Series C and the record humanoid-robotics investment cycle that has pushed Humanoid to a $1.35 billion valuation.
“As compute, memory, packaging and networking become increasingly interconnected, traditional approaches to system connectivity are reaching their limits,” said co-founder and CEO Ramin Farjadrad. “This financing positions us to accelerate product development, customer adoption and ecosystem expansion.”
Reporting based on coverage from Eliyan, HPCwire, Verdict, SiliconANGLE and Data Center Dynamics.